Overview
As the largest city in Northern Nevada, the City of Reno is nestled on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. With a population of more than 235,000, the City of Reno utilizes a decentralized purchasing policy overseen by a Purchasing Program that stimulates competitive bidding to obtain commodities and services at the best price while providing opportunities for all interested vendors.
Challenge
Marcie Wood, the Purchasing Program’s Management Assistant, has served the organization for 18 years. She noted that the 2020 pandemic instituted significant changes in the organization’s procurement processes as teams were sent home. Initially told they would be working from home for a couple of weeks, the realization soon occurred that teleworking would be semi-permanent for the rest of the year.
Results Using the PB System™
The City had implemented an eProcurement system – PlanetBids – in March 2019. Moving to automation was new for both City staff and suppliers, so the initial approach was to run dual systems – one automated and one manual paper system for issued bids. However, as staff quickly became comfortable with the new system and suppliers voiced a preference for online submissions, the City quickly moved to full automation.
Wood says that with automation, procurement was able to deliver effectively during the pandemic and handle daily operational needs for the City of Reno.
The Public Works Department, seeing the ease of a system handling goods and services, decided to try the system for construction bid projects, too. The module-based cloud system allows users to access the information, upload documents, and track submissions from any location – work or home - and removes the burden of mailing or delivering large paper proposals to downtown offices.
The City now uses the PlanetBids platform to manage all construction and non-construction bids, RFPs, and RFQs and maintain a database of registered vendors.
Wood acknowledges the online process has benefited the City in more ways than streamlining the process and reducing paper waste, although that in itself is significant. The City previously advertised their opportunities in the local newspaper and website. “While local businesses were accustomed to in-person meetings and submissions, they adopted the new procedures and now prefer the online process,” she notes. “It has resulted in a larger vendor pool with greater competition and increased diversity subcontracting.”
For procurement personnel, Wood states that having all the documents and requirements in one place has been very helpful and saves a tremendous amount of time when looking for specific documents or files. “The system provides a really easy step-by-step guide that helps me stay organized and ensure submissions are complete and made by deadlines,” she says.
When asked what would make the process even better, Wood shares that the City’s goal is to eventually bring on the evaluation module. Having the system track the entire evaluation process, conduct calculations, and aggregate final rankings will move toward greater efficiencies.
Chosen PB System™ Solutions
-
Vendor Management is the core of the PB System™ suite of modules. It offers a configurable and intuitive registration process to ensure that vendor registrations are complete and unique, avoiding duplicate records. Instantly gain access to vendor records, run advanced searches on multiple sets of vendor data, perform real-time verification of provided information (i.e., certifications and licenses), generate comprehensive reports with visual charts, and broadcast messages to selected vendors.
- Bid Management is the most complete web-based system on the market today. Procurement professionals can quickly manage the process of issuing, monitoring, conducting evaluations, and awarding formal and informal bids. More importantly, the PB System™ can handle construction and public works projects – a feature unique to the eProcurement industry. Vendors can interactively search, view, and respond to bid opportunities securely over the Internet.
